In the end, though, the true quality counted, the class told, the hotels around Wembley can begin taking their bookings for the final weekend in May.

And as Barcelona and Real Madrid weighed up what lies in wait for them under the glimmering arch next month if they emerge from the ultimate Spanish showdown, maybe we should start to re-evaluate this Manchester United team.

Why Fergie should pull out all the stops to hijack Neuer's move to Munich, by David McDonnell

The big man is back! How Wayne Rooney became one of the world's best players again, by Oliver Holt

Maybe we should start to realise what Sir Alex Ferguson has done again.

Maybe we should start to acknowledge that something special has emerged at the end of a season which was supposed to be about marking time.

Last night, as Fergie's men simply played Schalke off their own turf, in a display of supremacy the like of which you are not supposed to see at this level, the full measure of United was there for the world to see.

Mesmerising movement from Javier Hernandez, who has gone from rookie to superstar in a matter of months.

Brilliance and nonchalance from Wayne Rooney, back at the season of his darkest hour and doing everything in his power to wipe that Gelsenkirchen stain clean away.

Constant threat and danger out wide right and on the other flank a Korean powered by the most powerful batteries ever devised by Duracell.

A timeless, age-defying genius, a 37-year-old playing like a man a decade or so younger.

And a defence that has been, literally, impregnable on their travels round Europe, which gave Raul not even the merest hint that he could prove his talents have not diminished by his move away from Madrid.

Six away games, six clean sheets, a record that can never be beaten.

A team, perhaps, that is developing the same relentless, irrepressible, unstoppable mindset, that brought the Treble in 1999 and that other glorious night in Moscow three years ago.

It did not matter that, in the space of 90 minutes, United demonstrated that Schalke's fairytale run to the last four was exactly that - a dream founded on hope but which foundered when a real challenge entered the heart of the Ruhr.

Nor, in the end, was it relevant that United should have scored six or eight, and surely would have done had the utterly inspired Manuel Neuer not been keeping goal for Ralf Rangkick's outclassed troops.

All that counts, in the final analysis, is that the job was done. Not half-done, even if there is a second leg to play at Old Trafford next week.

But done. Over. Finished. No way back. The second leg is merely confirmation.

Not, until the 67th minute, that the scoreline reflected the sheer scale of United's domination, although that was down to one man.

From the third minute, when he clawed Rooney's glorious curler away from the top corner, until Giggs finally proved that he was human, Neuer was just magnificent, as Fergie readily conceded.

Save after save, stop after stop, a one-man wall of defiance behind a defence that parted like the Red Sea in front of him.

On any other day, Javier Hernandez could have had five for himself, and when the Mexican did manage to smash past the German keeper, it came after the flag was rightly up.

Fergie suggested that disallowed goal was key, that it proved to his players "they could actually beat the guy" and certainly before that Neuer was sensational.

He had to be to prevent humiliation, as United, with Rio Ferdinand and Nemanja Vidic so solid behind, poured forward from the start.

Rooney dropped of to orchestrate and the chances came thick and fast, Neuer denying Ji-Sung Park, Hernandez time and again, Giggs when his header simply had to finish in the back of the net, Patrice Evra at the start of the second period.

Briefly, as Jefferson Farfan blitzed down the right, Schalke rallied but that was the cue for their destruction.

Rooney moved inside from the left and then angled his pass back the other way, Giggs read it perfectly and this time not even Neuer could keep it out as he became the oldest man to score a Champions League goal.

Relief, reward, and soon the killer blow. Antonio Valencia played in from the right, Hernandez just got his pass away and Rooney, with a swing of his right foot, swept home.

Schalke knew the game was up, Evra was inches away from turning it into a rout.

Arguably, of course, the biggest test is yet to come. We know the date, May 28, if not the opponents.

They will have to conquer the greatest peak, under the greatest pressure.

But United are hitting their peak at the perfect time. Nothing will faze them now.